"This would be an outrage anywhere in the country but it
is especially galling that Laguna Honda is being rebuilt in the Bay Area, the
birthplace of the independent living movement."--From an ADAPT action
alert, on why disability rights advocates are fighting against the city and
county of San Francisco which plan to rebuild the nation's largest nursing
facility

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA--Ten people who are residents of Laguna
Honda Hospital, or are at risk of being institutionalized there, have filed a
class action lawsuit in U. S. District Court seeking access to community-based
long-term care services.

The lawsuit, filed last Wednesday, alleges that the City and County of
San Francisco, as well as several state agencies, are violating federal law by
failing to provide long-term care for people who would prefer to live in their
own homes. Those federal laws include the Americans with Disabilities Act
(ADA), the Nursing Home Reform Act, and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act
of 1973.

The plaintiffs want the court to order the agencies to use existing
community-based, non-institutional alternatives for long-term care and develop
new ones. They also want agencies to identify the long-term care needs of those
they serve, and determine whether those needs can be met in an integrated,
community-based setting.

The group claims that people who are eligible for alternatives to
institutional care are not allowed to choose home and community-based
alternatives. Many are not even informed of those options.

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA--Hundreds of disability rights
activists are expected to descend on San Francisco at the end of this week to
deliver a message to Californians and especially Mayor Willie Brown.

That message reads: "Just Say No to Laguna Honda! Tear Down the
Walls!"

Laguna Honda is the largest nursing home in the nation with 1200 beds.
Many of the residents live in rooms with up to 30 other people. It's also one
of the most expensive facilities, costing over $90,000 a year per person in
1999, compared to the national average of $40,000, according to the San
Francisco Examiner.

The good news that the 132-year-old facility will be torn down.

The bad news is that in November of 1999, San Francisco voters
overwhelmingly passed a $299 million bond issue to pay for building a new
Laguna Honda. Those plans are moving forward in spite of the world-wide
movement away from institutional settings, not to mention federal laws
promoting much less costly community supports and the June 1999 U.S. Supreme
Court Olmstead decision which ruled that "unnecessarily" institutionalizing
people with disabilities violated the Constitution.

The activists from several groups are calling on the city and county to
direct resources where they belong and will cost much less -- in the
community.

Hundreds are expected from the disability rights group ADAPT, which will
hold its Fall Action in San Francisco starting Saturday October 20 through
Thursday October 25.

Here are several articles and resources on the struggle against Laguna
Honda:

In July of 2000, a lawsuit was filed on behalf of 10 people who live at
Laguna Honda, claiming that the City and County of San Francisco violated their
constitutional rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act by pouring
resources into rebuilding the facility rather than providing community-based
alternatives. The San Francisco Chronicle wrote this story about that
suit:"Suit Says City Violates Disability Laws"http://www.inclusiondaily.com/news/institutions/ca/lh071400.htm

In August of this year, a U.S. District Court judge upheld the rights of
those people to move forward with the suit, after the city and county had asked
to have it dismissed. More details on that decision are available in the press
release from DREDF (Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund, Inc.),
which filed the suit:"Judge Says Laguna Honda Residents Can Sue City Of San
Francisco"http://www.dredf.org/press_releases/laguna.html

That's what the group of 600 disability rights activists from 30 states
assembled in San Francisco this week are calling Laguna Honda Hospital -- the
nation's largest nursing facility.

Activists are here because the city plans to tear down the facility that
houses 1200 people, and rebuild it at a cost of at least $600 million in public
money over the next 10 years.

After a rally at a park across the street from the facility Sunday, the
group marched silently around the facility, and left wooden crosses and Stars
of David near a statue of Florence Nightingale in front of the hospital in
memory of friends and loved ones who have died in similar institutional
settings.

Most of the activists are from ADAPT chapters from around the country,
joined by members of the National Coalition on Self-Determination, Coalition of
Californians for Olmstead, Independent Living Centers and other disability
rights groups.

The demonstrators want the city to scrap the idea of pouring millions of
dollars into incarcerating people behind expensive new institution walls, and
instead spend the money to move people into the community where they can have
freedom -- at a much lower cost to taxpayers.

"Instead of serving 1000 people in Laguna Honda at a cost of
$150,000/year, the city could serve nearly 5000 people in the community for the
same cost," said Mike Auberger, ADAPT National Organizer, who blames those who
stand to gain either financially or politically by rebuilding the huge
facility.

"It's simply wrong to hold people hostage so that others can profit from
their imprisonment,' Auberger said. "There's a better way, and that way is to
build community."

Activists Actions Lead To Meeting With Mayor,
But Arrests At State OfficesBy Dave Reynolds, Inclusion Daily
ExpressOctober 23, 2001

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA--Disability rights
activists from around the country blocked access to City Hall on Monday to
force a meeting with Mayor Willie Brown to discuss alternatives to rebuilding
Laguna Honda Hospital, the nation's largest nursing home. After several hours,
the Mayor's office agreed to meet Wednesday morning with representative from
the crowd of 600 demonstrators from ADAPT and other groups.

On Tuesday, similar attempts at the Hiram W. Johnson California State
Office Building yielded different results as California Highway Patrol officers
arrested over 100 of the protesters.

The demonstrators overwhelmed the building and the officers for several
hours, as they demanded a meeting with Governor Gray Davis to discuss the
state's lack of movement to implement the 1999 U.S. Supreme Court Olmstead
ruling. That decision held that "unnecessarily" institutionalizing people with
disabilities is a form of discrimination and violates the Americans with
Disabilities Act.

Davis refused to meet with the activists or to authorize the state's
Medicaid Director or the Director of Human Services to meet on his behalf.

As CHP officers tried to move people and wheelchairs from ramps and
entrances, several of the protesters slid out of their chairs and crawled up
stairs to the entrances.

"Governor Gray's refusal to negotiate in good faith made us even more
committed to hold our ground," said Daniese McMullin Powell, ADAPT Organizer
from Maine.

Nadina Laspina, an ADAPT Organizer from New York City, said her
experience on September 11 has given her actions here even more meaning.

"I live and work in the shadow of the World Trade Center, and I came
here to San Francisco because as a New Yorker, I witnessed an unspeakable
horror that left me feeling violated and powerless," Laspina said. "As a person
with a disability, I want to put an end to another horror that makes me feel
violated-the horror of Laguna Honda and of all nursing homes."

"For those of us who have managed to survive and escape them, the threat
of a nursing home is truly as frightening as the threat of terrorism. There is
a better way."

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA--After a meeting with the mayor of San
Francisco went sour Wednesday, disability rights protesters set their sights on
federal officials.

Mayor Willie Brown met briefly with a group of 15 protesters, as he had
agreed to do on Monday. But Brown refused to talk about community alternatives
to rebuilding Laguna Honda Hospital, the largest nursing home in the nation
with 1200 beds.

"The meeting with the mayor was a complete joke," said Stephanie Thomas,
an ADAPT organizer from Austin, Texas. "The mayor would not even start a task
force to study the issues."

Approximately 600 activists from ADAPT and other groups from around the
country are here to call on government officials to reconsider the plan, and to
redirect resources where they belong and will cost much less -- in the
community.

Two years ago, San Francisco voters overwhelmingly passed a $299 million
bond issue to pay for rebuilding the 132-year-old facility. Those plans are
moving forward in spite of the world-wide movement away from institutions, and
the 1999 U.S. Supreme Court Olmstead decision which ruled that "unnecessarily"
institutionalizing people with disabilities violated the Americans with
Disabilities Act.

ADAPT activists are not known for backing down easily or stopping when
they run into a barrier. After the fruitless meeting with the mayor, the crowd
of protesters, many in wheelchairs, moved directly to the federal building at
the United Nations Plaza. There they took up positions blocking the entrances
until they received guarantees of a meeting with local federal officials.

A meeting was arranged with Josh Valdez, the U.S. Health and Human
Services (HHS) Secretary's Regional Representative for Region IX, and Steven
Derring, the Region IX Deputy Director for the Centers for Medicare and
Medicaid Services (CMMS). Valdez and Derring agreed to meet again in two weeks
to continue the dialogue and address complaints filed with the HHS Office of
Civil Rights over California's lack of movement to enforce the Olmstead
ruling.

In July of 2000, a lawsuit was filed on behalf of 10 people who live at
Laguna Honda, claiming that the City and County of San Francisco violated their
constitutional rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act by pouring
resources into rebuilding the facility rather than providing community-based
alternatives.

In August of this year, a U.S. District Court judge upheld the rights of
those people to move forward with the suit, after the city and county had asked
to have it dismissed. More details on that decision are available in the press
release from DREDF (Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund, Inc.),
which filed the suit: "Judge Says Laguna Honda Residents Can Sue City Of
San Francisco" http://www.dredf.org/press_releases/laguna.html

SAN FRANCISCO,
CALIFORNIA--A U.S. judge has ruled that a civil rights lawsuit filed against
the City and County of San Francisco and the State of California on behalf of
residents of the nation's largest publicly-owned nursing home can move
forward.

Ten residents of Laguna Honda Hospital sued San Francisco and several
state agencies in July 2000, claiming the agencies violated the federal
Americans with Disabilities Act, the Nursing Home Reform Act, and Section 504
of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, by not providing community-based services
for those who want to live in their own homes instead of nursing homes and
other institutions. The lawsuit cites the 1999 U.S. Supreme Court Olmstead
decision, which ruled that "unnecessarily" institutionalizing people with
disabilities is a form of discrimination.

Lawyers for San Francisco filed a number of legal motions to have the
case dismissed.

According to a media release from the San Francisco-based Disability
Rights Education & Defense Fund, Inc. (DREDF), District Court Judge Saundra
Brown Armstrong ruled on December 18, 2001 that some of the claims made by the
original plaintiffs must be removed from the suit, but that the case will move
forward.

"The plaintiffs have waited long enough," said Buckmaster de Wolf, a
partner at Howrey Simon Arnold & White, who is also acting on behalf of the
plaintiffs. "It is time to move forward with this case."

Last October, hundreds of disability rights activists gathered in San
Francisco to protest the city and county's decision to rebuild Laguna Honda
which houses over 1,000 people.

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA--The U.S. Department of Justice says that
the city and county of San Francisco are violating the rights of people housed
at Laguna Honda Hospital by not providing them with the choice to live in the
community.

The 134-year-old facility is the oldest nursing home in California and
the largest in the United States with 1,200 beds.

Assistant Attorney General Ralph Boyd Jr sent a 30 page letter to San
Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera last month, informing the city that it
violates the Civil Rights of Institutionalized Persons Act by not providing
alternatives to the nursing home. Boyd said the Justice Department could sue
over the violations, but wants to work cooperatively with the
administration.

Boyd's letter is the result an investigation by the Department of
Justice and the Department of Health and Human Services. It noted that dozens
of those housed at Laguna Honda Hospital have no medical needs being met by the
nursing facility.

In 1999, San Francisco voters approved a bond to help pay for a new $401
facility to replace Laguna Honda. Boyd called the efforts to rebuild
"misguided".

The DOJ letter backs up actions by disability rights advocates who have
tried to keep the new facility from being built.

In July 2000, a group of Laguna Honda residents sued San Francisco and
several state agencies, claiming the agencies violated the federal Americans
with Disabilities Act, the Nursing Home Reform Act, and Section 504 of the
Rehabilitation Act of 1973, by not providing community-based services for those
who want to live in their own homes. The lawsuit cites the 1999 U.S. Supreme
Court Olmstead decision, which ruled that unnecessarily institutionalizing
people with disabilities is a form of discrimination.

In October 2001, approximately 600 activists from ADAPT and other groups
from around the nation gathered in San Francisco to protest the plans to
rebuild the aging facility.